


It's Our Last Summer

by sherific



Category: The Iliad - Homer, The Song of Achilles - Madeline Miller
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Neighbors, Bittersweet, Comfort, Cute, M/M, Moving On, Moving Out, Summer, Sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-11
Updated: 2015-07-11
Packaged: 2018-04-08 18:16:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,894
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4315350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sherific/pseuds/sherific
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Patroclus is packing up for college. He grows close to Achilles, and they bond over the tough transition.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's Our Last Summer

            There’s a certain heartache that goes along with this song, like someone’s turned the volume knob so that it softly hurts you, slowly. It’s sticky this summer, the heat is sweltering. The ceiling fan spins and spins, trying as hard as it can, but it can’t ward off the heat too well. I stare at the fluorescent light. I’m bored, I admit. It’s three weeks into vacation, and I’m bored. Unproductive, my mother says. Restful, my father says. I don’t know who to listen to. It’s my last summer here. I don’t think I have to listen to anyone, at this point. I think I’ll go walking tomorrow. I won’t be here for long.

            There’s a kid my age down the street. We were never friends, really. His name is Achilles, the great irony being that my name is Patroclus. I think our parents went to college together, apparently all of them had some love of the classics. We don’t have that sort of connection. We used to kick rocks across the street when we were little, and that’s about it. He runs track at school. He got a scholarship to some big university across the country for it. I’m just going to school a few cities north. He’s more spectacular than I am. I guess it’s fitting, given our names.

            My exploring starts there, in front of his house. It’s the biggest on the block. His parents are more successful than mine. He’s sitting on the front steps, stretching. I think he’s about to go on a run. I wave. He waves back. We don’t say anything. Maybe we’ll cross paths, him on his run, me on my nostalgia trip. It’s really hot out. I hope he’s bringing some Gatorade with him.

            We do run into each other, a few blocks away.

            “Hi,” he says.

            “Hi,” I say back. He’s a lot taller than me, and a lot more good-looking.

            “Whatcha doing?” He sips his Gatorade. He’s sweating.

            “Taking a walk. What about you?”

            “Going for a run.”

            “Cool.” We don’t have much more in common. We’ve talked only a few times.

            “It’s hot out,” he comments.

            “Yeah.”

            “I’m walking the rest of the way. Come with?”

            “Sure.”

            We walk back. The sun is beating down hard. It’s a little less boring, someone being next to me. We don’t say anything. It’s our last summer. I think we both think about how we are not kids anymore.

            I see Achilles at the park a week later. He’s sitting on the swing, kicking the wood chips by himself. This was his childhood park, too.

            “Hi,” I say.

            “Hi,” he says back. He’s grinning, today.

            I sit on the swing next to him. “Whatcha doing?”

            “Sitting. You?”

            “Same.”

            We kick woodchips together.

            “Did you run today?” I ask him.

            “Yeah.”

            “How’d it go?”

            “Nice.”

            “Cool.” He’s going to be a star, at university.

            “What do you like doing?” he asks.

            I shrug. I didn’t know he was going to ask. “Thinking, I guess.”

            He nods slowly, in approval. “Cool.” I wonder what he thinks I’m going to be, at university.

            I’m not bored today. I like seeing Achilles, I think.

            It’s very hot, come July. I go to the ice cream shop more and more, see people from my high school class. There’s Helen and Hector and Paris and all of them. They don’t notice me, really. Helen giggles, Hector brags, Paris listens to Helen. I sit outside and eat vanilla ice cream. Achilles shows up, sometimes. He chats with everyone. He’s the type who has friends and enemies. Some people made it to the same university as he did. They’re all very smart.

            Mid-July, and Achilles sits with me, outside. He’s holding a vanilla ice cream.

            “Hot, hot,” he says, smiling.

            “Yeah.”

            “You walk here alone?”

            I nod.

            “Let’s go together, since we live so close.”

            It’s our last summer. “Yes,” I say.

            “What did you think about today?”

            “I thought about…” I furrow my brow. “I thought about what I’d like to do in university.”

            “That’s kinda boring, don’t you think?” He doesn’t say it harshly. “I think that you should think about now.”

            “Now?”

            He nods. We finish our ice cream, walk home together. _Now,_ I think.

            Next day, he knocks on my door. I am not dressed.

            “Let’s not get ice cream today,” he says. I forget he had asked.

            “Okay,” I say.

            He opens my door wider and walks inside. He is uninvited, but it definitely doesn’t feel that way. The ceiling fans are spinning. He sits on my couch.

            “Do you have a pool?” he asks.

            “Why?”

            He shrugs. “I want to go swimming, and I don’t have a pool.

            “I have a small one.”

            “Let’s go swimming, then.”

            When we get out to the pool, he takes everything off, except his boxer-briefs. He jumps in without ceremony, and laughs loudly.

            “Get in, get in!” he says.

            I change into swim trunks in the bathroom, and I get in. It is nice, the temperature of the pool. He splashes me, again and again. I feel like a little kid. Today is not boring. I like being with Achilles.

            Three hours later, we get out. I get us some towels, it is dark outside.

            “Thanks for letting me swim,” Achilles says.

            “You’re welcome.”

            I watch him, as he sits and looks up at the bug zapper. Why did I never know him, when we grew up only four houses away? I think that we are different. He likes to do, and I like to think about doing. That is why I am always bored, I think.

            “Come here, Patroclus.” He says my name for once.

            I walk over. He tugs on my hand and pulls me down onto the chair, we are squished together.

            “What are you thinking about right now?” he asks.

            I shrug helplessly. “I don’t know,” I say.

            He puts his hand on my head. I really like being with Achilles.

            It is the last week of July, and I see him running. He’s light as air, and he smiles, smiles, smiles. I’ve seen pictures of this in the school newspaper, but never in person. How can he do it, in this heat? I don’t think he’s human. He waves to me. I wave back. He blows a kiss, and I don’t know what to do.

            It’s the last day of July, and he ends his run at my house.

            “Do you have Gatorade?” he asks, panting.

            I nod and I show him to the kitchen. He sits on my counter, swinging his legs. I hand him a cool Gatorade, and he drinks it gratefully.

            “How was your run?” I ask him.

            “Fun.” He caps the Gatorade. “Do you run, Patroclus?”

            “No,” I answer plainly.

            “Oh.” He swings his legs again. “What did you think about today?”

            “Ice cream.”

            He smiles. “Vanilla?”

            “Two scoops,” I say.

            “Fun,” he says. He nudges me with his foot. He throws off his shoes and does it again. I turn red, my face is hot as concrete. I love being with Achilles.

            It’s August, and I start thinking about school. I start packing my things, and I start feeling sad. It’s as hot as it’ll ever be. I am putting away my books, when Achilles knocks on my door. Tears are streaming down his face.

            “Patroclus,” he sobs. I don’t know why.

            “Oh, Achilles,” I say.

            “It’s our last summer,” he cries.

            He is right. He throws himself on me, and I try to soothe him. I don’t think that he has run yet, today. Maybe that’s why he’s emotional. I bring him to my room, let him sit on my bed. It is a hard time, for all of us kids. We aren’t kids, anymore. I wonder how much packing he has done. Today, I am not happy. Neither is Achilles.

            Night falls, and he’s still here. He has eaten dinner with me, has helped me pack. He asks me where I’m going to school, and if I’m excited. I only have an answer to one question.

            “I can’t believe we lived down the street from each other this whole time,” he says.

            “Me neither,” I say.

            “I like you, Patroclus.”

            “I like you too, Achilles.”

            He shakes his head. “I don’t think you understood. I like you, Patroclus.”

            He sleeps in my bed that night. I am sad, but not bored. I love Achilles.

            It’s the beginning of the second week of August, and my room is practically empty. Achilles runs a little slower. I ask him to go on a walk with me. Today, we hold hands. We have missed out on a lot. It’s hard to make up, all this time in one summer.

            “Are you done packing?” I ask.

            He nods. “Are you?”

            “Yes.”

            “Let’s get ice cream.”

            Everyone is there. Helen gasps when she sees us holding hands, and Hector frowns. Paris doesn’t care. This is as much of the high school romance that we will ever get. Helen thinks we are grasping at our last moments of childhood. She is jealous, of course. We eat vanilla outside. I don’t want to leave Achilles.

            It is the day before we both must leave. I don’t know what to say to him. He just comes over, and we sit by the swimming pool, and we cry little boy tears. I will miss Achilles.

            It has cooled down a lot outside. I am loading my things into the trunk, hoping that they will all fit. My parents are going to make me drive. I am no longer a child. I watch Achilles, who’s doing the same thing down the street. He looks up, and our eyes meet. I shut the trunk, and I run down the pavement. We meet at the middle, he who is the really tall track star, and me, the short boy who likes to think too much.

            “I have something for you,” he says. I am surprised. He hands me a little book. _Children’s Homer_ , it’s called. “We’re in it,” he says, smiling.

            I page through it. “So is Hector, and Helen, and Paris,” I note.

            “Yes, but _we’re_ in it.” He has put little notes in the books. The address of the ice cream shop, his favorite flavor of Gatorade, a list of things I think about.

            “I don’t want you to go,” I say. “We have wasted so much time. We only had a summer.”

            His phone number is written in Sharpie in the back cover. “It’ll never fade,” he says. “I’ll never change it, so you can always call. Call me, Patroclus.”

            I don’t know what to do. I just hug him. We have never kissed. We don’t kiss then, either. Kissing is not for children. I love Achilles.

            When I get to university, I call him. He answers promptly.

            “Are you running?” I ask.

            “Going to.”

            “Drink a lot of Gatorade.”

            “Yeah.” He pauses. “What are you thinking about?”

            “You,” I say.

            “Oh,” he says back.

            I have four months until the end of the semester. I count each week, when I’m bored. I hope Achilles is running very fast, at his university. I bet he’s a star. He’s just the kid down the street. We only had one summer. It was enough, I think, to get something started.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I felt that in The Song of Achilles, the story of Achilles and Patroclus was very much a story of growing up and facing reality, so in this story, I addressed a major transition that occurs in the lives of the teenagers today, just as the war in Troy was a major transition for Achilles and Patroclus in the book.


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